Aside from the Dead jam & Donovan, Mt. Jam I Think has another origin point from a late 1960s record -- it was posted here one time many moons ago, IIRC a single artist w/Mtn Jam listed, IIRC, on the album -- anyone?

Apparently it came from Jerry Garcia. Years ago Bill Graham said in an interview he walked back to the dressing rooms at the Fillmore and Jerry Garcia, Peter Green and Duane Allman were jamming to Donavon's First Their Is A Mountain and began to notice both the Dead and the ABB began playing variations of it in their shows but with the Dead it was sporadic and the ABB began playing it every show. If the Dead jammed to the song in 1967-68, it must have come to Duane from Garcia. Duane is said to have played it with the Dead in early 1970.

Butch Trucks said the ABB played with the Dead a lot in the early years and to him the Dead was boring. They just milled around on stage often playing loose jams of their material in no particular order and even attempted to play songs they never played before and some of those would become train wrecks to the point they just stopped mid song, looked at each other and Jerry or somebody you start another song. Butch said he ask Bill Graham how the Dead was able to draw such big crowds playing like that and Graham said it was more about the experience being with the crowd and the whole vibe of the crowd and the image of the band. Butch said after Duane died they all went on a 3 year drunk and he can't remember what the ABB was doing on stage so they probably had train wrecks too.

They did have one big train wreck I saw in 1974 at the Atlanta Braves baseball stadium. The band was out of sync the entire show. Gregg blew the lyrics several times, Lamar Williams played one or two songs and was replaced by someone from Grinderswitch or something similar, Dickey eventually stayed behind the drums, didn't play many solos including no solos on Southbound and sometimes had a towel on his head. Chuck Leavell and Jaimoe were the only ones that could bring it and Chuck played some extra solos when others couldn't play theirs and Lynyrd Skynyrd played before the brothers and just flat blew the Allman Brothers off the stage in Atlanta off all places. Anybody heard a tape of that show? Maybe it was better than I remember.

But the 6 shows I saw in 1973 when Brothers and Sisters was just out, the Chuck/Lamar version on the band, though different than the original lineup and to me not as magical as the original band, kicked butt and smoked at the shows I saw. If they had played like that in Atlanta, Ronnie and the boys would have been equaled if not topped.

BTW, the reviews of the show I read said the Brothers camp said someone laid some bad drugs on the band which crippled several members and Lamar so much he had to leave the stage.

Aside from the Dead jam & Donovan, Mt. Jam I Think has another origin point from a late 1960s record -- it was posted here one time many moons ago, IIRC a single artist w/Mtn Jam listed, IIRC, on the album -- anyone?

Someone had the theory linking Herbie Mann's "First There is a Mountain" instrumental cover that appeared on his 1968 album, Windows Open, and Duane's session work with Herbie on 1971's Push Push, which doesn't really line up.

[Edited on 7/31/2018 by porkchopbob]

Thank you porkchopbob -- that indeed was the discussion -- glad to know my memory is still intact 😮

I always thought they got it from the Dead song Alligator which was released in 68.

I think I got that link to start about 8:45 and the Mtn Jam riffs start around 9:00

Here's an earlier thread on the topic (and I'll bump it up):

http://www.allmanbrothersband.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=XForum&file=viewthread&tid=116031#pid

I always thought they got it from the Dead song Alligator which was released in 68.

I think I got that link to start about 8:45 and the Mtn Jam riffs start around 9:00

I get this image of Duane hearing the Dead tease and saying "Goddamn!?!?....why didn't they take it firther!?!?...By god, me and the brothers will!!!!"

Alligator sheds his skin, to find a butterfly within...
Alligator sheds his skin, to find a butterfly within

I know those aren't the right lyrics, but that's how I hear it after the song has been morphed through both bands!

The Ivan "Boogaloo Joe" Jones version tommars posted -- that too was it, may also be earlier in the thread
Would be so good to know if Jaimoe or Dickey have any recollection of this, or the Herbie Mann version -- or just how they hit on what became Mtn. Jam --
Mayb during the very first jam, the March 1969 mindbending 3-4 hour Jacksonville Jam (w/Reece Wynans) -- heck they had Liz Reed mastered in just a few short months --

as tommars said they were big into jazz in the early days, ie Coltrane, the Tony Williams Lifetime, Rashan Roland Kirk, Miles -- the Mahavishnu Orchestra etc -- recall reading somewhere, Lifetime's first album, Emergency! played non stop during the hippie crash pad days

merged all that into Donovan's version (he's credited as D. Leitch on EAP), to come up with something so mind bending -- 2 full sides of music, & undescribable brilliance the whole way thru
I love the ABB

[Edited on 8/1/2018 by Stephen]

I just skimmed the Live Show Database, and the first set list cited is May 4, 1969 in Macon GA. I'm not sure if this is reliable (1969 documentation of the Allmans is a bit hazy), but it includes "Mountain Jam", and there are no other shows in March or April listed that would have put the Allman Brothers & the Dead on the same stage. That seems to dispel the direct Dead influence since the Allmans wouldn't likely have heard the Dead playing "Mountain Jam" except in person.

However...Here is audio from the show, "Mountain Jam" (all 90 seconds of it) starts around 24:00 coming out of a drum solo which all sounds briefly like the Dead's "The Other One".

Also, I didn't realize "Liz Reed" was worked out so early in 1969. They came a long way in a short period from that Jacksonville show in March.

[Edited on 8/1/2018 by porkchopbob]

The addition of IMOER to that 5/4/69 setlist looks really questionable. It's not listed on the HTW Live Show Database for that date.

The addition of IMOER to that 5/4/69 setlist looks really questionable. It's not listed on the HTW Live Show Database for that date.

I noticed that too, and the tape quality seemed to change as well. I had always thought "Liz Reed" was written in late 1969.

That is right Pork chop. The ABB was in Macon for a couple of days. They were touring pretty much non stop then including some free concerts and did 307 shows in 1970. But not all lasted more than 2 hours but the grind of traveling from town to town is the same, especially when they were in a small vehicle. The Winnebago made it a little easier to stretch your legs on the road.

Dickey was fascinated with Box Scaggs' girlfriend and wrote the song for her while in Rose Hill Cemetery. And as you probably know, couldn't name it for her as she didn't want Boz to know she was also romantically involved with Dickey. So he noticed the inscription "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" on the grave stone on which he was sitting.

Dickey took the basic cord structure and melody to the band and everyone liked it so the entire band worked up the arrangement and Butch Truck's wrote a drum part for it and they began playing it in very early 1970. They often played it first in very early 1970. Start with Liz Reed and end with Mountain Jam showing their instrumental power and improv on both ends.

Reposted from the “Why did they play Montain Jam” thread:

What I do know first hand is that Gregory once told me that the song was brought to ABB by Duane.
As Gregg told me, when Duane one day suggested doing the song to the group and met with protests over doing a Donovan cover, he responded with “No, not the whole song. I think just the hook riff and melody would make a great launching point for an instrumental jam.”
ABB gave it a try and liked the results.
It always cracked me up that the younger whipper snappers in the crew had no idea that the song was based on a 60’s cover or even who Donovan is. LOL
Warren’s tech, Brian Farmer, was one of those and he always laughed at the lyrics.
He and I started doing little hand-jive routines on the side of the stage of mountains that appear and disappear, and of butterflies and caterpillars crawling on garden gates, whenever the song was played.
Brian loved it and always broke out in laughter whenever it got played.
He would often have me recite the lyrics to new crew folk who had no idea what the song was about.

Interesting commentary from Donovan himself regarding the genesis of the melody that caught Duane's ear:

The main riff from another one of your songs, “There Is a Mountain,” became the basis of the Allman Brothers Band’s “Mountain Jam.”

That’s right! It seems that you could say—and maybe I’m not the one to say it—that I’m a master of the riff. There’s two riffs going on in that song. Now, I didn’t write the second riff. I wrote the first riff. [Jamaican record producer] Wayne Jobson said to me, “Don, you were the first to tap into that. You knew about calypso. You knew about bluebeat. You knew about ska.” I used to hang out with the Rastas and go down to [London’s] Portobello Road with a good friend and score a little bit of ganja. I also met the families in the Jamaican communities. So Wayne said, “By the way, that rhythm on ‘Mountain’ was picked up by your session guy,” and that session guy was [Jamaican flutis] Harold McNair. And he said, “That rhythm you’re doing is not reggae or calypso or ska; it’s called Barbados scratch.” All across the islands were different blends of African rhythms. Harold came up with the second riff. But how did we know that it would be picked up by them [Allmans] and become a highlight of their live concerts?

Reposted from the “Why did they play Montain Jam” thread:

What I do know first hand is that Gregory once told me that the song was brought to ABB by Duane.
As Gregg told me, when Duane one day suggested doing the song to the group and met with protests over doing a Donovan cover, he responded with “No, not the whole song. I think just the hook riff and melody would make a great launching point for an instrumental jam.”
ABB gave it a try and liked the results.
It always cracked me up that the younger whipper snappers in the crew had no idea that the song was based on a 60’s cover or even who Donovan is. LOL
Warren’s tech, Brian Farmer, was one of those and he always laughed at the lyrics.
He and I started doing little hand-jive routines on the side of the stage of mountains that appear and disappear, and of butterflies and caterpillars crawling on garden gates, whenever the song was played.
Brian loved it and always broke out in laughter whenever it got played.
He would often have me recite the lyrics to new crew folk who had no idea what the song was about.

May I ask if Gregory mentioned WHEN Duane brought the idea up?

Donovan's lyrics are a zen koan about illusion and attachment.

Original ABB straight hippie band. So much revisionist history.

Shame the New South only lasted about five minutes.

Dovetail, I don’t know. Gregg didn’t specifically say. My impression from the way he worded it to me was that Duane had this conversation with Gregory and then went to the band. I was also under The impression that this was sometime during Big House days.

[Edited on 8/5/2018 by DavedK]